Laying Low At Lupin's
by NoahBody
Summary: A brief veiw of the day Sirius turns up to 'lay low at Lupin's. SLASH RLSB, don't like it, don't read it. Rating for future chapters.
1. Remus Turned him Away

I'm embarrassed that I ever turned him away. I mean, I could have let him hide out with me, could have saved him from thirteen years of hell. But I, the one whom he had never judged, had misjudged him. That night, that night that Lily and James died, he showed up, raving, at my door. I'm embarrassed to say that while I may have turned him away, I also didn't turn him in.

"Run," I told him. "Don't tell me what you did, I can guess, just leave, NOW!"

I didn't wait for a reply that night. Instead I threw the vase at him. I'd done it once before, but that time the excuse had provoked it, not a desire not to hear it.

Sirius left, like I asked him to, fleeing, that sad look shadowing his grey eyes. I thought that I would likely never see him again, and that couldn't have bothered me more if it tried. Sirius was gone… what was terrible wasn't his leaving, but what he had done, what the Sirius that I knew would NEVER do.

So, I am embarrassed to say that I kicked him out. If I had been there, maybe he wouldn't have gone after Peter on his own. Maybe I could have convinced him to stay away from him. Maybe he could have convinced Dumbledore to see his side of the story.

So now, I'm here, standing in front of him, he's at my door for the first time since then. There had once been time for this embarrassment, this particular issue. Now, there was all the time in the world. All the time to remember throwing that vase, to see the marks from it in the wood of the doorframe. And Sirius is just staring at me, eyes deep and impassive. Silently, our eyes lock, and I can see suddenly what I used to, his soul. If I had only thought to look that night… but I can't think of that now, not with his eyes so forgiving. He looks so different, but the soul is the same, just damaged. I can tell. I could always tell.

Wordlessly, he embraces me. This is so very different than that embrace in the shack, this is a different crime to forgive. But he's hugging me, and I'm hugging him, and we're both crying. Or maybe it's just me. I can't tell anymore. I'm in his arms, where I belong, and I can't imagine being anywhere else! I wouldn't want to be.

There's no need to speak, none. So we head inside without speaking. I don't have a guest room, I've never needed one. Sirius knows it, and knows well enough that he'll sleep in my bed tonight.

"Padfoot…" I say, uncertainly.

"Mooney?" It sounds as if he thinks that I'm about to talk about it, about that night.

"You need a bath."

And we both laughed as if the years had never gone by us.


	2. Safe

Chapter 2

I wasn't certain what to say when I approached Remus' door this morning, I almost walked away, almost ignored Dumbledore's instructions, "Lay low at Lupin's." I'll admit, I was shaking at the door. I mean, sure I'd seen Remus at the shrieking shack, and sure he'd forgiven me but.. I could vividly remember the last time I'd stood at this door. When he had told me to run, run and not come back…

Now I'm glad I showed up here. Remus is snoring quietly, and I am bundled in his arms, wearing a pair of pajamas that I gave him a long time ago. I am warm and safe under the quilt, with Remus' arms wrapped tightly around me, holding my face close to him, so that each time I breath I can smell the Remus-y scent of him. I'm clean, and full of food as I haven't been in a while. Comes from hanging around in a cave for so long, living on the local rats.

But Remus has fed me, he even washed me up, as he used to in days long past, when I would refuse to shower unless he joined me. Remus is a sucker for a good ploy, and he never seemed to mind much. So now I'm happy. I like being clean, being dirty reminded me too much of being in Azkaban.

Remus' snoring is keeping me awake, but not in that unpleasant way that implies that I actually want to sleep. I am staying awake to listen to the snoring. His snoring is comforting to me, and it's been so long since I've heard it. It took me years to be able to sleep well without it. I spent years at school complaining about it, and then when I no longer was around to hear it, I missed it. Amazing, really, how things like that work. Now, however, the sound is there lulling me, along with the gentle beat of his heart.

This moment will stay with me forever, just like all the others. Laying here is like heaven. It's hard to believe that I'm still alive, and that I'm not yet dreaming.

_________________________________________________________________

The large, warm, human shape in my arms is shifting, I can fell it twist slightly. That, however is not what is waking me. A soft whimpering is resounding in my ears, breaking through the fuzz of sleep. I shift into a sitting position. Sirius, still held in my arms, is tossing and thrashing against me, whimpering and crying in his sleep. Though I see no tears on his face, I can tell that these sounds are sobs.

"Sirius," I try to rouse him softly. "Sirius, wake up." More urgently now, I shake him gently. He cries out again, pushing his arms straight out, trying to knock me away.

"Sirius!"

"Stop, no, stop, please!"

Sirius' eyes fly open, and he looks wildly around the room, eyes visibly dilating. After a minute or so, he seems to calm down. He looks up into my face, eyes full of unshed tears and relief.

"Just a nightmare, Padfoot, it was just a nightmare." I whisper to him softly, trying to calm him.

Sirius continues to whimper softly, burrowing his face into my chest. My arms encircle him, and I try to calm him down, rubbing his back gently.

"It was just a bad dream, you're all right." I murmured into his hair, kissing his head, like a mother reassuring a small child.

"That's the-the problem, Mooney, it's not." He whimpers against me.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what the dream must have been. In times past, my first guess may have been his family, but Sirius had long since denounced his family, taking the Marauders to be his surrogates, a replacement. No, that wasn't the dream. Azkaban, was the nightmare. Had to be. There isn't much I can do for such nightmares. All I can do is hold him.

This reuniting is going to be harder than I thought, it appears. Sirius is… more delicate, than before. Azkaban has effected him, and in no good ways.

"Not a dream, Mooney." He murmurs again, cutting off my train of thoughts.

"Just a dream, Paddy, you're here, at my house, you're safe." I say, using his old pet name, one which only I have ever been allowed to call him.

"Safe?" His tone is so questioning, like a small child, unsure during a storm.

"Safe."


	3. Trials and Tribulations

Chapter 3 Trials and Tribulations

The light streaming through the curtain window wakes me first in the morning, still held in Remus' arms. Much as I don't want to, I slip out of my warm spot in his bed, and pad down the hall trying to remember the location of the toilet.

After I've relieved myself, I head to the kitchen. I think that perhaps I'll be nice and make some breakfast. The kitchen took less time to locate than the lav had, after all Sirius Black never forgets the location of anywhere that food is kept. Who do you think located the Hogwarts kitchens?

And so it was that when Remus came down stairs, it was not he, the "Housewife" of the two of us in the kitchen cooking eggs, but me, the man who burns water, ruining the eggs. Perhaps it was the smoke which had awakened him. Either way he's rushing into the kitchen, bellowing about a fire.

There's no fire, just me, with a frying pan, one that is, admittedly, smoking a little bit. Remus just sighs, turns off the stove, moves the pan to the next burner, pulls the screaming teakettle off of the stove, and turns off several appliances that have been accidentally switched on.

"Sirius, don't you remember the rules?"

"No cooking without supervision…" I mumble, staring down at the floor.

"Consider that rule still in effect." Remus says. I nod glumly.

The only things that I had not managed to ruin were the coffee, and the coco. These were the two items that I had always made in the past, and the two that I can still 'cook'. The coffee was poured and handed to Remus, and I took a mug of coco in hand to drown my sorrows in.

Though one might think that Remus would be the one to drink the coco, however this was not so. The drinking of these beverages stemmed from a tradition begun in school.

For years Remus would pour himself coco, and pour my coffee, I always took the black coffee and tried to sip at it, but it always tasted bitter, so I would start stealing Remus' coffee to sip from, and begging him to drink mine instead because I didn't want it. After a few months of the two of us switching drinks every meal, Remus just began giving me the coco straight off. Then, once we were both a bit more than half way down with our drinks, we would pour them into the same mug and take turns sipping it. James said it was disgusting, but I always liked it.

So Remus and I now each have a mug, one with coffee one with coco. The only thing to eat is burnt toast, the eggs are beyond repair, the bacon is burnt into dust, and Remus never did keep cold cereal around. The water I had boiled for oatmeal was useless, as Remus apparently ran out of oatmeal a few days ago. So, we're sitting in silence, me sulking, Remus quietly munching his toast and reading the paper.

I only drink half of my coco, he finished his coffee. Somehow, it makes me sad, I feel… forgotten. Like Remus has let go of all memories of me, erased me and our old habits from his brain. I want to cry. But I won't cry, last night was… a unique exception. No, Sirius Black doesn't cry, and so I don't. It's a trivial thing to cry over anyway.

_____________________________________________________________

I was about half way through the sports section when I noticed Sirius staring blankly into his half full mug.

"Aren't you going to finish that?" He looks so upset… but why? Why would he be? I don't think I've done anything to upset him.

"No." He says, his voice soft and husky.

"How come? Is something wrong?"

"No, nothing, no reason." His voice becomes guarded, as does his expression. I wonder if I've done anything, but I don't think that I have…

"You seem upset." Didn't I used to always know what was wrong? I had gotten so used to that insight… and now I don't have it. I've forgotten how to examine him to figure out what's wrong. It's been a long time. Sure, I knew the dream last night, but that was different.

"Nothing is wrong." Oh dear, now he seems angry. He stands up, shoving himself so violently from the table that he knocks his chair over. He throws it upright angrily and storms from the room. I'm not sure if I should follow him or not… I think I ought to.

So I follow him from the room. My house is small, a quant little living room, the kitchen, bedroom and bathroom, and a little closet in the hall. That's about all. There's a tiny nook that was meant to be a dining area, but which I've converted into a library. My house is a cottage really, light and open and airy. There are plenty of windows to show the view of the mountains surrounding the private little valley that I live in. I love my house.

Sirius is in the bedroom, riffling through a drawer. I lean against the door frame, watching him. What on earth is he doing? What's he looked for? There's nothing special about that drawer it just… used to have his stuff in it. It's where I had gotten the pajama's last night. I had only accidentally kept them, I had done an otherwise perfect job of… oh God, of course! I've done a perfect job of erasing him from my life, surely he's noticed. I'd forgotten all about our old coffee coco ritual, in fact, if I had cooked breakfast, I wouldn't even have remembered to make the coco. I've removed all of his cloths from his old drawer, cleared out his side of the closet, emptied the three bathroom drawers that he used to use, thrown out his knickknack collection on the shelves of the library… I've done the best job I could to forget him completely…

"Sirius…" But what can I say?

"Mm." He grunts, without turning around.

"Sirius I… I'm sorry." Now he's turning. Now he's looking at me. All the anger from the kitchen is gone, and it's replaced with that horrible sadness. I've seen it in those beautiful grey eyes before. It's the worst reaction he could have. If he shouted, anything, this would likely be easier… but no, no it wouldn't be.

"You've… forgotten me, Mooney." It wasn't a question.

"I… No, I haven't forgotten you, Padfoot, I've tried, but I couldn't forget you." I'm speaking in earnest, it's true, it really is.

"Padfoot, you know why I wanted to forget, you know." I'm merely whimpering now, I try to pull myself together, but it's hard. I'm remembering why I tried to eradicate him from my life. It's not a pleasant memory.

"I know…" Sirius says. He sits on the edge of the bed. I creep slowly over and sit beside him. Hesitantly a place an arm around his shoulders. He slowly relaxes and leans his head on mine.

"We've missed out on allot of years, Mooney." He says softly to me, wistfully.

"We'll just have to make them up, Padfoot."

"I suppose."

I kiss the top of his head, and lean my cheek against his soft hair. It's warm here, sitting like this, and though the moment isn't happy, I could easily be content this way.


End file.
